Valve Software founder and CEO Gabe Newell has been pretty clear over the past year that Linux is a key platform for the company going forward. Newell, a Microsoft alum, was dismissive of Windows 8 last year, and the company shipped a Steam client for Linux in February; now has nearly 200 games running on the open-source OS which will also be default foundation for the SteamOS gaming operating system.

But in case there was any doubt about its Linux tilt, Valve is joining the Linux Foundation, a non-profit organization that promotes the care and feeding of Linux. The move should give Valve a boost developing a gaming platform in an environment currently dominated by proprietary console OS products that have been developed over years at a time (and, in Microsoftâ€™s case, cross-pollinated well). Itâ€™s also a boon for Linux, which continues to remain somewhat marginalized in the gaming world, as larger companies often only choose to publish games for PC and Mac.